Australia vs England 2nd Test Day 5 Highlights – Dec 6, 2017

Eng v Aus The Ashes highlights today – Second test day five from Adelaide Oval (Australia) Wednesday 6th December 2017. Yesterday England’s captain JE Root and DJ Malan gave a big headache to Australians but at the end of the day DJ Malan got out at 29 and all pressure gone which was created by both batsmen. Now JE Root still not out at 67 with CR Woakes who scored 5 runs and England is 178 runs behind from the target with six wickets remaining. If England achieved this second test target then it will be the highest chase for England and also it will be listed in top ten highest successful runs chases. The last time England highest successful chase was 332 almost 90 years ago.

Day five report

England arrived at Adelaide Oval on the fifth day knowing that hope springs eternal, or at least until Joe Root gets out. And so England’s hope sprung for only 17 deliveries. By the time the day was three overs old, Josh Hazlewood had dismissed Root and Chris Woakes, and within two hours Australia had won the Test and taken a 2-0 lead in the series. At least the England fans who had awoken in the small hours back home in anticipation of a tense final day could get some sleep. The day began with England 178 runs from victory with six wickets in hand. They added only 57 to their overnight total for the loss of all six of those wickets. That England even fought back into this match, that they entered the final day with any sort of hope whatsoever, was a surprise in itself. But if Australia officially won the Test on the fifth afternoon, in reality England had lost it on the first two days, when they sent Australia in and saw them make 442.

It left England needing their all-time highest successful chase to win this match, and the final day began badly when Woakes edged behind off Hazlewood from the second ball – Snicko confirming his fate despite a review. In Hazlewood’s next over he claimed the key wicket of Root, who did not add a run to his overnight score of 67. On a surface that had been good for batting all match, a ball finally stayed a touch low and kissed the toe of Root’s bat on the way through to Tim Paine. From then on it was only a matter of time, and not even much of that. Moeen Ali was trapped lbw trying to sweep Nathan Lyon on 2, and the rest of the damage arrived with the new ball. Mitchell Starc curled the very first delivery with the new pink Kookaburra in to the pads of Craig Overton, who was lbw for 7; Stuart Broad edged behind off Starc for 8; and the result was confirmed when Jonny Bairstow chopped on against Starc for 36.

Starc had finished with 5 for 88, but it was Hazlewood’s two early strikes that set the tone for the final session of this Test. After a day of England fight, normal service had resumed. And if the Gabbatoir is the fortress at which Australia like to open their summer, the Adelaide Oval day-night Test is becoming a strong occasion for them as well – the Australians have now won all three pink-ball Tests played in Adelaide. Now the teams fly to Perth with Australia just one win away from regaining the Ashes. And if Root wins the toss at the WACA, don’t expect him to do anything but bat.

Day four report

Momentum is a curious, intangible beast, impossible to measure but easy to see. There are players who claim that it doesn’t exist, yet what else but momentum can explain the fact that England are even remotely back in this Test match? England, who were thrashed by 10 wickets in Brisbane. England, who here sent Australia in, saw them bat into six sessions and declare at 8 for 442. England, who batted so poorly that they gave Australia the chance to enforce the follow-on. And therein lies the crux of this momentum shift. Steven Smith did not make England bat again, preferring to give his bowlers a rest. In doing so, he made his own men bat under lights on the third evening, when England’s bowlers hooped the ball around and gained confidence. On the fourth day, Australia were knocked over for 138, and James Anderson claimed the first five-wicket haul he had ever managed in 15 Tests in Australia. The previously anosmic England had the trace of a sniff.

By stumps, England had doggedly worked their way to 4 for 176, with their captain Joe Root the key man, unbeaten on 67, alongside Chris Woakes on 5. The momentum had threatened to swing back to Australia late in the evening when Pat Cummins rattled the top of Dawid Malan’s off stump, and might have done so had Woakes not jammed down on a sizzling Cummins yorker from the penultimate ball of the day. In the end, England went to stumps needing a further 178 runs with six wickets in hand. Yet if Australia’s position was much the stronger, England might have felt that they won the day, for they ended it with more chance of victory than when they had started. In the final session, it was the Australians who looked nervy, Smith losing both of his side’s reviews in the space of three balls as he sought a fourth wicket.

Objectively, this made little sense. To win, England would need to rewrite history. Never before have England chased down a target as high as the 354 they were set here. For nearly 90 years, their record chase has been 332, achieved by a team that boasted Jack Hobbs, Herbert Sutcliffe and Wally Hammond in their top four. To triumph at Adelaide Oval would not only break England’s record, it would be one of the top 10 chases in all of Test history. Australia’s mood was not helped by an incident in the fourth over when Josh Hazlewood rapped Alastair Cook on the pads from around the wicket. The lbw appeal was turned down by umpire Chris Gaffaney, presumably feeling the ball was sliding down leg. Neither Hazlewood nor wicketkeeper Tim Paine seemed desperate to convince Smith to review, and Australia left it alone. Ball-tracking would have given them the wicket, the ball smashing into leg stump.

Perhaps that played a role in Smith’s eagerness to review later, first when Pat Cummins thought he had Root caught behind and then when Hazlewood struck Malan on the flap of the pad in the next over. No Snicko, no Hot Spot, no “umpire’s call”, just lost reviews that would not be refreshed. At least in the meantime, Smith had made one good review, when Nathan Lyon straightened one to trap Cook lbw for 16. Cook and Mark Stoneman had given England just the solid start they required, but on 53 their partnership was broken by Cook’s departure, and Stoneman fell with only one more run added to the score. Having scored at a run a ball for his first 28, he had been stifled for some time when on 36 he tried to glide Mitchell Starc away to the off side and succeeded only in sending a catch to Usman Khawaja at gully.

James Vince did little for his Test reputation by driving breezily at Starc and edging to first slip for 15, which left England wobbling at 3 for 91. But Root and Malan worked hard through the tricky evening period for a 78-run stand. Root, in particular, was excellent, seeking not just to survive but to score – though he had a nervous moment when given out lbw playing no shot to Lyon, a decision that was overturned on review. If Smith’s hundred was the defining innings at the Gabba, Root could yet make the difference here. The day had started with Australia on 4 for 53, leading by 268 runs with six wickets in hand. It was a powerful position by any standards, yet England had gained confidence on the third evening and they did not let Australia slip away too much on the fourth day.

Anderson finished with 5 for 43 and a torn pair of trousers sustained while diving in vain for a return catch. He began by removing the nightwatchman Lyon, who chipped a catch to mid-off for 14, and followed by having Peter Handscomb caught at third slip for 12. Handscomb is the only Australian who might be considered in danger of losing his place anytime soon and did little in this innings to show his form as anything but scratchy. Paine made 11 before he was brilliantly caught by Craig Overton, running in from fine leg and diving to collect the top-edged hook off Woakes, who then grabbed his fourth wicket by bowling Shaun Marsh for 19. Starc made 20, the equal top score in the innings (along with Khawaja) before he skied a catch off Anderson to give the fast bowler his fifth wicket. The innings was wrapped up when Hazlewood sent a catch to gully off Overton, leaving Cummins not out on 11. It meant that Australia’s 138 was the highest total in Test history in which no batsman had scored more than 20. That was one record broken. Now England hopes that another will follow.